For those of you too young to remember, there was a time when we either drove regular body Ford Econolines or stepvans. Some stations even had Dodge vans, and in areas where they were needed there were even Chevy S-10's with cargo tops.
Back then you had to peel a sticker with tracking number off pkg, if it had one, and place it on your delivery record, paper of course. If it didn't have one you wrote the tracking number on record and you always printed recip's name, address, and time of delivery. Many of you newbies remember the super tracker but I became a courier shortly after it was introduced. The older guys at that point were still trying to figure it out.
Pickups meant punching zip into tracker and then writing URSA on pkg with magic marker. I seemed to have ink on my hands all the time.
Back then we had dress shirts with military style epaulets on our shoulders. A guy with 10 year epaulets was someone to be respected back then.
Back in the good old days we managed our time, and were judged primarily by how much we did. And since the work was more time consuming back then we had more couriers doing less, instead of our hyperproductive jobs now where less people do more, and are pushed to do even more than that, and after adjusting for inflation are being paid less.
Federal Express was more physical then, couriers had to know more, and there was a sense that we were all in it together. There are some things I miss, some I don't, but it was definitely a different world before 1994 or so. I wish everyone could've experienced the company back then. And I wish the company would realize that you can't conjure up loyalty and productivity with dinners, banners hung from the roof, and little awards. Better pay gives us a vested interest in seeing the company succeed. Get us to better pay faster and I believe you'll get the productivity you want.
Back then you had to peel a sticker with tracking number off pkg, if it had one, and place it on your delivery record, paper of course. If it didn't have one you wrote the tracking number on record and you always printed recip's name, address, and time of delivery. Many of you newbies remember the super tracker but I became a courier shortly after it was introduced. The older guys at that point were still trying to figure it out.
Pickups meant punching zip into tracker and then writing URSA on pkg with magic marker. I seemed to have ink on my hands all the time.
Back then we had dress shirts with military style epaulets on our shoulders. A guy with 10 year epaulets was someone to be respected back then.
Back in the good old days we managed our time, and were judged primarily by how much we did. And since the work was more time consuming back then we had more couriers doing less, instead of our hyperproductive jobs now where less people do more, and are pushed to do even more than that, and after adjusting for inflation are being paid less.
Federal Express was more physical then, couriers had to know more, and there was a sense that we were all in it together. There are some things I miss, some I don't, but it was definitely a different world before 1994 or so. I wish everyone could've experienced the company back then. And I wish the company would realize that you can't conjure up loyalty and productivity with dinners, banners hung from the roof, and little awards. Better pay gives us a vested interest in seeing the company succeed. Get us to better pay faster and I believe you'll get the productivity you want.